myvanwy gibson - ART IS THE MACHINE (SERIES)

ART IS THE MACHINE (SERIES)

This series is the result of a philosophical investigation in which I explored the idea that one can go around to the other side of the work and see it as though in a mirror when painting on transparent substrate. This gave me an understanding of the idea of the dialectical consciousness and consequently an interest in the philosophy of becoming. My writings on this were published as a paper in the proceeding of International Association of Empirical Aesthetics.

Following on from this research I worked with the more than 40 works on plexiglass exploring the idea that an intuitive, subconscious practice opens the way for new concepts. Numbers were allocated to the works chronologically (in the order that each work came to be). These individual works created new works when placed together. For example No 282729 was created from three panels of plexiglass (numbers 28, 27 and 29) superimposed over each other.

Each piece is a seperate action. The transparent support means that these actions are seen in reverse and it allows for the possibility of combining the actions.
Each seperate piece is named with a number. (The numbers are allocated in a time-based, linear way - meaning in the order that they came to be).
A new work is created when a new, spontaneous action happens in the combination of past actions - those seperate times combine in the present and create a new number. (The new number is generated via reading from left to right and front to back, closest to the viewer first).
So each work immaterially exists, however not every work can materially exist at the same time, at the same present.